


Freedom! '17

by mrs_d



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: M/M, Sam and Steve Do Lip Sync Battle, SamSteve Gift Exchange, a thank you gift to our wonderful mod!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-15
Updated: 2017-01-15
Packaged: 2018-09-17 17:07:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,527
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9334556
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mrs_d/pseuds/mrs_d
Summary: “Lip Sync Battle,” Robyn, their publicist, repeated. “You want to do Lip Sync Battle? Live?”





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ficbypen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ficbypen/gifts).



> Thank you so much for all your hard work in coordinating the SamSteve Gift Exchange! (And for all that other wonderful stuff you do!) I hope this fic gives you some well-deserved joy, and I hope I did your beloved George Michael justice.

Sam’s nervous— no, terrified. The lights are bright, he’s sweating in his two layers of costume: Usher on the surface and MC Hammer underneath. If he survives long enough for both shows, they’re going to have to re-do his makeup backstage. He’s sure it’s all run down his face by now.

Beside him, Steve looks calm, chatting with LL Cool J about power sanders, of all things. Sam isn’t sure how they got onto the topic. He wants to rub his hand against Steve’s denim thigh and feel the smooth glide of the silk stockings underneath. The touch would ground him, but, even better, it would make Steve look at him; his blue eyes would be as steady as ever, reminding Sam that he’s okay, that they’ll get through this.

“Quiet on the stage,” calls the set manager. “We’re live in thirty seconds.”

Sam gulps. Why did he agree to this?

 

_“Lip Sync Battle,” Robyn, their publicist, repeated, raising one dark, perfectly sculpted eyebrow. “You want to do Lip Sync Battle? Live?”_

_“Live,” Steve confirmed._

_“Why?” she asked, completely dumbfounded._

_“I think it’ll be fun,” said Steve. “And it’ll give me a chance to tell the world something I’ve—” he took Sam’s left hand “—we’ve been putting off.”_

_Robyn looked down at their joined hands and sighed. “You want to break the Internet, don’t you?”_

 

Sam’s up first, which, really, is just as well.

“What’s your first song gonna be, Falc?” LL Cool J asks.

“There Goes My Baby,” Sam tells him. The crowd cheers, and he steps into the spotlight, exactly where he doesn’t want to be.

But as soon as the opening bars start to play, Sam finds himself relaxing. This is his song — he knows it backwards and forwards; he’s been belting it out in the shower for years. It has a good little intro, which Sam uses to stroll to the edge of the stage, crouch down and touch some of the audience members’ outstretched hands. And when the drum pattern hits, he slides up to his feet and gets right into it, letting the melody move his hips in a way that makes Chrissy fan herself and pretend to swoon.

It takes everything — absolutely everything — in him not to look over at Steve when he mouths the first line after the chorus, “Bet you ain’t know that I be checking you out when you be putting your heels on.”

 

_“Don’t you dare,” Steve told him sternly when Sam suggested it. “You look at me then, and I’ll lose it. You look at me, it’s over.”_

_“All right, all right,” Sam said, raising his hands in surrender. “When did you become such a drama queen?”_

_Steve grinned. “Today.”_

_“Yeah. Right,” Sam grumbled._

 

The crowd’s pretty chill after Sam’s song — it is a ballad after all — but that’s okay; Sam’s feeling a little looser now, a little more comfortable in his own skin. He even manages some banter after, and sways his hips again when Chrissy asks him to. He glances over, catches the last second of Steve licking his lips, and he laughs. He’s cool with being the warm-up act tonight.

LL Cool J brings Steve up next, and he introduces his first song, “Born In The USA.” Robyn suggested it. (“Trust me, it’s appropriate,” she told them. “Everybody misreads it the same way they misread you.”) Sam’s glad that they listened to her, especially regarding Steve’s simple Springsteen costume — those washed-out jeans leave nothing to the imagination, and Sam’s got a fantastic view from back here.

After the first chorus, Sam remembers that he’s on camera and jerks his eyes away from Steve’s ass — just in time to see Steve’s gaze land on him as he mouths, “my VA man.” Sam wonders if his startled reaction makes it to the airwaves.

Steve acts shy after his song, giving the crowd his patented _Aw, shucks_ routine when they shout and stamp their feet for him. When LL Cool J comments that he’s dressed like Springsteen, Steve turns it up to eleven, and replies that it had been an accident.

Sam knows better, of course. Just like he knows what Steve has on underneath that outfit.

 

_“I don’t know if these are the right size,” Sam said doubtfully, when the stockings arrived on their doorstep._

_“Let’s see,” said Steve. He took them delicately, stretched them out with his big, callused fingers. “They should be good,” he concluded. “They always have more give than you think.”_

_“Okay,” said Sam. He’d never worn stockings, so he supposed he just had to trust Steve on that one._

_“Come on, help me try them on,” Steve suggested, already undoing his jeans._

_“Jesus, at least close the curtains first,” Sam chastised him, only half-joking._

_“Why?” asked Steve, and it sounded like a serious question._

_Sam bit his tongue, then forced out a little laugh and shooed Steve towards the bedroom._

 

They cut to commercial after Steve’s interview, and Sam is hustled backstage, hands grabbing at his clothes and shoving him into new ones — a white suit with huge shoulder pads and snaps all along the legs. More hands are at his face, dabbing powder on his forehead, re-pencilling along his brows, brushing at his cheeks, putting his shades on over his eyes. A member of the crew takes his arm while he’s still adjusting the glasses and hurries him down a narrow staircase. She positions him on the platform that will launch him onto the stage and waits with him while the stage manager counts off the seconds until they’re live again.

Above them, everything goes quiet. Then, there’s the rumble of LL Cool J introducing the song, and then, finally the song’s opening voiceover.

“Ready?” the crew member whispers, and Sam nods.

“Because you’re too legit. Too legit,” James Brown’s voice emphasizes, “to quit.”

A split-second later, Sam is flying.

 

_“Is that safe?” Steve had asked him, when Sam told him about this aspect of the performance._

_Sam nodded, about to reassure him, and then he remembered who he was talking to, and he glared instead. “You invite me to jump off high stuff with you on a regular basis, but you’re worried about a trap door?”_

_Steve’s mouth worked for a moment, and then he shrugged. “I love you?” he offered, like it was a Hail Mary._

_Sam rolled his eyes, because it really was._

 

It’s a short trip, but somehow Sam’s pants become twisted on his way to the stage, and he’s afraid they’re going to fall off, so he keeps one hand down there during the whole first verse, praying that it doesn’t look like he’s fondling himself live on TV.

The crowd goes wild when Sam appears, but he barely hears it, what with having to lip sync and dance and hold his pants up all at the same time. Luckily, he gets to rip them off halfway through the second verse, revealing the spandex wrestling outfit underneath. He tosses his suit in Steve’s direction — LL Cool J leans out of its path — only noticing when the song ends that Steve’s put the jacket on, inside out with its shoulder pads drooping comically.

When it’s over, Sam’s breathing hard, feeling like he’s just done a couple dozen aerial loops — so, full of adrenaline, but also a little sick. But he makes it through the interview, works the crowd into another round of cheers and whistles. When LL Cool J leads him back to sit down on the now-empty corner of the stage — Steve was whisked away almost before the commercial break began — he’s relieved. He lets one of the stage hands help him back into his baggy jeans and black t-shirt, sips at a bottle of water she got for him. He got through it, he tells himself, and he thinks he did a pretty good job of it, too.

“We’re trending,” calls one of the crew members during the break, and Chrissy does a little victory dance that gets the audience laughing. She’s wearing Sam’s jacket now, right side out, almost buried in its massive shoulders.

“Now for the fun part,” Sam says under his breath without meaning to. Thankfully, his mic’s been turned off.

 

_“Are you sure we want to do this?” Sam asked him, not for the first time, while they were waiting for their driver to pick them up from their separate dress rehearsals. “People will talk.”_

_“Let them talk,” Steve replied, scrolling through something on his phone disinterestedly._

_“It’ll be all over the Internet,” Sam added, a little more cautiously._

_Steve lowered his phone, sent Sam a shrewd look. “Which of us are you trying to convince, Sam?”_

_Sam found he couldn’t hold Steve’s eye. His gaze dropped, landed on Steve’s feet. Ten minutes ago, in the studio, he’d been wearing the Louboutins that Sam had helped him pick out. Now his feet were safe in their regular running shoes. Sam envied that self-assuredness, the ability to move flawlessly from one to the other without any fear of judgement._

_“I’m sorry,” Steve said a moment later, touching Sam’s hand in a gesture that wouldn’t seem overly friendly to anyone who happened to be looking. “That wasn’t fair.”_

_“No,” Sam said without hesitation. “You’re not wrong.” He attempted a smile, didn’t quite get there. “Guess I’m just not as ready for the shit storm as you always seem to be.”_

_“Takes practice,” Steve murmured. He was standing very close now, rubbing Sam’s forearm. “That’s all.”_

_Sam nodded, patting Steve’s hand and stepping back. He knew he didn’t imagine the tiny pained expression that flickered over Steve’s face. “You wanna get some dinner?”_

_Steve stared for a moment, then smiled. “Actually,” he replied in a low voice as their driver pulled up to the curb. “I’ve been working on this move, this little dance thing I’m doing with my hips. Maybe tonight I could it to show you, you could tell me what you think?”_

_“I guess we could do that,” Sam agreed with a little laugh._

_Steve got the door for him, and patted his ass on the way into the car. From a distance, Sam hoped no one saw that._

 

The crowd goes absolutely silent when Steve appears — Sam’s pretty sure he can hear himself blink. He’s as awed as the rest of them, at the sight of 6 feet (almost 7 with heels), 240 pounds of superhero bound together by silk and leather, accented by glittering gold jewelry.

Then it’s like a wave goes through the theatre, as people realize that, yes, that is Captain America up there, striding towards the edge of the stage and touching the record player prop. He’s barely recognizable under the makeup and clothes — a mesh shirt combined with George Michael’s iconic leather jacket, and booty shorts on top of stockings on top of heels.

Sam’s too transfixed to worry about the cameras. He finds himself caught in an extremely vivid fantasy of grabbing that leather-swaddled ass and licking up Steve’s neck, sucking that dangling cross earring into his mouth. Steve is just so goddamned _pretty_ , and his confidence — well, that was one of the first things that attracted Sam to him. This is different from running around the National Mall, though; this is a peacock’s strut, a model’s pout, a dancer’s twist of the hips.

The room buzzes for two beats of the intro, and another wave goes through the crowd as they recognize the song. And then they start cheering.

The sound snaps Sam out of his head, reminds him what they’re doing here, what Steve’s plan is. His mouth goes dry when Steve gets to the chorus, and—

“I think there’s something you should know, I think it’s time I told you so,” Steve mock-sings. “There’s something deep inside of me, there’s someone else I’ve got to be....”

—one last tendril of fear, tight and deadly cold, contracts around Sam’s heart.

 

_“So, George Michael wasn’t out when he released it?” Steve asked, once they were finally eating that dinner that Sam had suggested._

_“That’s right,” Sam said. “But, looking back, I think a lot of his music was about trying to come out and not being able to.”_

_Steve nodded. Sam knew he still didn’t quite get it — you really had to be there, to understand what it was like to be queer in the 90s. Steve was practically a millennial when it came to queer history; even though he ran from police raids in the 40s, it was hard to get from history books the strange combination of optimism and oppression that characterized the community in the late 20 th century. _

_“And when he did make it official, when he was kinda forced to,” Sam went on, “one of the things he said was that he thought maybe he wanted to be caught, wanted to just get it over with.”_

_“Is that what you think we’re doing?” Steve asked, after a pause. “Getting it over with?”_

_Sam winced — it wasn’t exactly a nice turn of phrase. Sounded more like ripping off a bandage than putting a part of yourself on display and asking for the same amount of acceptance that people had given you before._

_“Well, we could get caught making out in the bushes in Central Park first, if you like,” Sam tried to joke, but Steve didn’t laugh. He reached across the table to squeeze Sam’s hand._

_“Sam. Are you sure we want to do this?”_

_It wasn’t the first time he’d turned Sam’s question back on him, and Sam swallowed hard, letting the anxiety build as he thought about it again, re-tracing the lines of possible consequences as they spun out around him. He could picture the headlines, hear the outraged news anchors, see the subtle ways that people would change their behavior around them._

_Steve waited, not saying another word to try and convince him. Because Steve would always wait for Sam, who did what he did, just slower._

_Finally, Sam caught up. He looked into Steve’s earnest blue eyes and saw the ways that hiding was hurting him, hurting both of them. He nodded._

_“Yeah. I’m sure.”_

 

Sam is trapped, stuck on live TV in the middle of a near-panic attack. He forces himself to breathe, misses a good chunk of Steve’s song because his ears are buzzing, but he comes out of his haze long enough to hear the audience chanting the chorus — _Freedom! Freedom!_ — and when he lifts his head, Steve’s familiar eyes are right there, looking into him as mouths, “I won’t let you down, I will not give you up.”

The icy terror in Sam’s chest warms, its grip loosening a little; his heart can breathe again.

Too soon, the song ends, Steve closing it out with the line, “Sometimes the clothes do not make the man.” His next move is a complete surprise. He spins on one heel to face Sam and —  incredibly — blows him a kiss.

Stunned and suddenly giddy with what they’re doing, Sam laughs and blows one back. Steve looks thrilled, and Chrissy presses her hands to her heart.

“Wow, what a show,” LL Cool J cries, once the roar of the crowd has subsided a little. “Captain America, who knew you had it in you?”

“Well, the USO probably did,” Steve replies, getting a laugh out of the crowd.

“I have to admit, you surprised me — I think it’s safe to say you surprised everybody tonight,” LL Cool J goes on. “So why’d you pick this song?”

Sam knows that this is the only question that Steve had requested of the producers.

“I guess you could say that George Michael and I have some things in common,” Steve says.

“Oh? And what would that be?”

Steve half-turns towards Sam, his eyes asking one last time, giving him one more possible out. But Sam doesn’t take it. He gets to his feet, makes his way to Steve’s side, and, just like in any battle, being there makes Sam feel braver.

“I’m queer,” Steve says simply, and the audience gasps. “Bisexual and genderfluid, to be exact. And this is my boyfriend, Sam.”

“Hi,” Sam says into Steve’s mic, trying to sound serious, even though he has a bizarre urge to giggle at how LL Cool J seems completely speechless.

Luckily, Chrissy is there in a pinch. “Oh my GOD,” she squeals, climbing down from her platform to wrap each of them up in a tight hug. “You guys!!”

“Uh, wow,” says LL Cool J, regaining his composure after a moment. “Congrats, I’m happy for you two.”

“Thanks,” Steve replies. He pulls Sam close to his side and plants a big waxy kiss on his cheek that will probably take forever to scrub off. “We’re happy, too.”

The audience cheers again, and LL Cool J signs off, promising a winner when they return from the commercial break. He still looks a little dazed when the feed cuts out, and Steve, being Steve, starts apologizing.

“I didn’t mean to put you on the spot there,” he says. “I just love your show so much, and I knew that you probably wouldn’t let me do it if I said anything in advance.”

“No, we’re good,” says the producer, coming onto the stage and shaking Steve’s hand. “You just did more for our ratings than we ever could have guessed. Thank you, Captain Rogers. And congratulations, Mr. Wilson,” he adds, shaking Sam’s hand, too. He looks Steve up and down, almost wistful. “You’re a lucky man.”

Sam feels his cheeks heat, but he laughs and puts his arm around Steve’s waist anyway. “I know.”

After the commercial, Steve is declared the winner — Sam graciously accepts his defeat — and the cameras quit rolling for good. Steve’s talking to the producer again, and Sam wanders the stage, waiting for him. Most of the audience has left, but he notices a few stragglers, watched closely by the impatient security personnel. They’re stalling, Sam realizes, when one of them explains that they’ve lost a lens from their glasses, and they just need another minute to look around for it.

Sam waves the guards off and sits down on the edge of the apron. “You guys want some autographs or something?” he calls, inviting the small, scattered group to come closer. “Because Steve can—”

“No,” replies one of them. Sam isn’t sure if they’re a boy or a girl. They’re young, probably not even old enough to drink, with an angular hair cut and two lip rings. Their cheeks color when Sam looks right at them, but they hold their chin up high and add, “I just wanted to thank you.”

“Me, too,” says another, a pretty woman in her thirties, holding hands with the woman beside her.

“Me, three,” a man chimes in. He’s almost as old and as big as Sam is, with beefy arms and a US Navy t-shirt. “You don’t know how much it means to have you guys on our side.”

“We were always on your side,” Sam protests, but the man shakes his head.

“This is different. You telling the world that you’re—” he falters, like he’s suddenly remembered that Sam didn’t give himself a label earlier.

“That you’re like us,” the pretty woman’s girlfriend finishes for him. Her voice is deeper than Sam expected, and her eyes are shiny with tears.

Sam makes a decision, and hops down from the stage. “Come on, get over here,” he says, opening his arms.

The woman steps back, a little startled, but when Sam raises an eyebrow, she accepts his offer and hugs him tightly. She’s sniffling when she pulls away, but she’s smiling, too.

“Anybody else?” Sam asks, and soon they’re all hugging him, telling him their stories. Alex moved out of their parents’ house at 15; Siobhan met Laura at her first Pride; Jamie’s been in the Navy since he was 18, and in the closet even longer.

Suddenly Steve is there, at Sam’s side, holding Sam’s hand. He’s in his jeans, but the heels are back, so he has to bend slightly to listen, to give and receive some hugs of his own. He and Sam pose for pictures, give out their contact information, offer to keep in touch.

“You did it,” Robyn tells them, when they’re in the dressing room, in the process of removing their makeup.

“We sure did,” says Sam, looking into his own eyes in the mirror. He looks different now, or maybe he just feels different.

“No, I mean, I was right,” Robyn clarifies. “You broke the Internet. The Twitter servers just crashed, and Facebook’s barely holding up under the strain.”

“Oh,” says Steve, sounding a little sheepish. “Whoops.”

Robyn stares at him for a long moment. “ _Whoops?_ ”

“If it makes you feel any better, he says the exact same thing when he blows other stuff up, too,” Sam consoles her.

“Weirdly, that does help,” says Robyn with a sigh. “But, just so you know, this is only the beginning. The shit storm’s on its way, and it’ll stay for a while.”

Sam looks to his left and meets Steve’s eye. “Bring it on.”

**Author's Note:**

> Musical/Visual References:
> 
> [There Goes My Baby](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m6urbZyHgO4)
> 
> [Born In The USA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EPhWR4d3FJQ) 
> 
> [2 Legit 2 Quit](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_UJaLq4YOo0)
> 
> [Anthony Mackie's performance of 2 Legit 2 Quit on Lip Sync Battle](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPWs1QkK9k8)
> 
> [Freedom! '90](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=diYAc7gB-0A)
> 
> [Zachary Quinto's performance of Freedom! '90 on Lip Sync Battle](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TROfag5mSFE)


End file.
